Wycliff Palu and Matt Carraro want to make most of Waratahs' best shot yet at Super Rugby title

A week off, a home semi-final and, if they make the cut, a home final. Waratahs veterans Wycliff Palu and Matt Carraro know this is the team's best shot yet at an elusive Super Rugby title.

Palu made his Super Rugby debut in 2005, the year NSW first made a final, and returned to Christchurch as the Waratahs' starting No.8 three years later for a rematch with the Crusaders. The Waratahs flew home runners-up both times, but will have home-ground advantage if they make it this year.

Golden chance: Wycliff Palu knows the Waratahs' chances of winning a Super Rugby title have never been better. Photo: Ben Rushton

"I think it's one of the best chances we've got, ever since I've played anyway," Palu said. "The two finals we lost [2005 and 2008] we had to travel away with the Crusaders ... this is a good shot for us."

Carraro spent two seasons at NSW before heading to Europe for stints with Bath and Montpellier. He started on the bench when the Crusaders used their home advantage to put the Waratahs to the sword 20-12 in 2008.

"I think we're in with a great shot," he said.

"I played in 2008 and I was quite inexperienced, it was only my second year in Super Rugby. I guess I was along for the ride, building up in my career, and now I guess I feel I've contributed a bit more to this campaign.

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"We're confident, we've got our style of play, but we're definitely not arrogant in that matter. We've been quite convincingly beaten a couple of times this season and the way the games have gone, it's been quite up and down and hard to pick winners. We're coming in with quite good form and are just focusing on our own game."

It has been almost three months since the Waratahs lost a game, going down 21-13 to the Blues in Auckland on Anzac Day. Their three other losses were to the Force, Sharks and Brumbies, all of whom were able to bully the Waratahs off their game.

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"We've got an identity we're trying to build here and create for the future of the Waratahs," Carraro said.

"In those games we've been beaten, we definitely haven't stuck to that, we definitely didn't work hard enough and we definitely didn't back ourselves in our style of play."

Carraro is returning from a shoulder injury he picked up playing for Randwick during the June Test window. Carraro, winger Peter Betham (knee), prop Paddy Ryan (ankle) and fullback Israel Folau (corked thigh) will be available next week. Only Jono Lance is under a cloud due to a knee injury.

The Waratahs are using their week off to rest weary bodies and steady themselves for the task ahead.

"It's come at an opportune time for us," assistant coach Daryl Gibson said.

"We've managed ourselves really well up to this point and the benefit of having three or four days where you can actually take the time and get all the guys absolutely right and firing, so we can have a good training [session] at the end of the week, is ideal for us."

There is the potential to lose momentum, but when the Waratahs could have dropped their bundle after losing half the squad to the gruelling three-Test series against France last month, they did the opposite, extending their winning streak to five, six and then seven straight games.

Carraro said there was good and bad to be taken from the break.

"The more you play continuous rugby, the more you have a chance to build, but for us it's not taking our foot off the gas, and training hard this week," he said.

"At the back end of the week, we're going to do a lot of team work and skills and patterns and plays, to just make sure it's game intensity at training, because we are missing that contest on the weekend. It's not a week to rest."